Contrite heart

“. . . a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.”

– Psalm 51:17b

Where do you place the word “contrite”? I mean, where do you most often hear that word being used? For me, I think of the courtroom. I imagine a news report that reads something like “The convicted defendant faced the jury with a steely countenance; she showed no contrition for what she had done.” Or perhaps “The defendant was contrite and, weeping, apologized to the victim and their family from the stand.”

My online dictionary search gives a definition for contrite as: feeling or expressing remorse or penitence; affected by guilt. Interestingly, the definition is then immediately followed by a citation from today’s verse, “a broken and contrite heart.”

Let us remember where we’ve come in verses 16 and 17 — “For you have no delight in sacrifice; if I were to give a burnt offering, you would not be pleased. The sacrifice acceptable to God is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.” This invites us to ponder the nature of insincere worship (both corporate and individual) and then the authentic baring of one’s soul to God. Does our Sunday worship give us the opportunity to do this? Do we do this on our own time?

Unlike my imagined courtroom scenes, we stand before a different judge. We step into the witness stand, our Lord presiding, and we have the opportunity to either (a) try to talk our way out of something or (b) open our heart. Thankfully, this judge is our ever- loving God. Isaiah 57:15 portrays God’s outlook upon us beautifully: For this is what the high and lofty One says– he who lives forever, whose name is holy: “I live in a high and holy place, but also with him who is contrite and lowly in spirit, to revive the spirit of the lowly and to revive the heart of the contrite.

Jesus of course continued this mission of reviving the spirit of the lowly and those with contrite hearts. He told a crowd on the hillside: “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth” (Matt 5:1-5).

Prayer

Precious Lord,

Take our hand. Help us to come before you and, without guile or pretense, honestly offer our lives to you. Help us to be both contrite and trusting in the one whose love endures forever.